


Shush

by kinole009x



Category: Bohemian Rhapsody (Movie 2018), Queen (Band)
Genre: Diabetes, Drama, F/M, Family Fluff, Johnica Week 2020, Old Married Couple, One Shot, Protective John Deacon, Sad John Deacon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-17
Updated: 2020-01-17
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:41:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22284289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kinole009x/pseuds/kinole009x
Summary: A modern day encounter with his son leaves John deep in thought and eventually transports him back to a hospital room in 1994, where there's only one thing on his mind:He had already lost Freddie a couple years before.  He wasn't about to lose his baby son, too.
Relationships: John Deacon/Veronica Tetzlaff
Comments: 16
Kudos: 23
Collections: Johnica Week 2020





	Shush

**Author's Note:**

> In honor of Johnica Week!  
> Prompt: Painful Memories

_**2019** _

John gently massaged his heart as he entered the kitchen and plucked his car keys off the hook on the wall.  
  
Veronica looked up as she carefully lifted a whistling tea kettle off the stove. "Is he ready to go?"  
  
"I suppose," John said with a sigh as he kissed his wife on the cheek and turned to go.  
  
Veronica caught his hand before he could leave. "What happened?"  
  
"What makes you think something happened?" John asked.  
  
Veronica gave him a knowing look, before taking his hand, which was still resting over his heart, and holding it tightly in both of hers. "You only ever hold your heart when something is upsetting you."  
  
John closed his eyes as his own voice echoed in his ears. _Cameron? Did you take something?_

"John," Veronica squeezed his fingers.  
  
 _To get your blood sugar up...  
_  
"I interrupted him while he was...erm, streaming," John said quietly, trying not to think of lakes and rivers. He was well aware it wasn't _that_ kind of streaming.  
  
 _Five minutes 'til your appointment.  
  
_ "We've all done it," Veronica reassured him. "It's nothing to be upset about."  
  
"He shushed me..." John said tersely and looked away.  
  
"Oh John," Veronica said gently. "He's young. He doesn't mean anything by it..."  
  
"...three times," John added.  
  
"Do you want me to take him to his appointment?" Veronica offered.  
  
"No, no," John said, as he untangled his fingers from hers and planted a light kiss on the back of her hand. "I'll take him."  
  
It was only once John was sitting safely in the driver's seat of the car, waiting for Cameron, that he allowed his head to wearily fall back against the head rest as his fingers gradually crept up to his heart once more.  
  
And in only seven seconds...  
  
 ** _1994_**  
  
...he was back in a small, dim hospital room, holding a crying baby against his chest as his paced the room nervously.  
  
"Sshh," he whispered into his son's ear as he rubbed gentle circles into his back. "Cameron, shhh."  
  
Unexplained vomiting, weight loss, and irritability had prompted John and Veronica to bring Cameron to the emergency room and now, they could do little more than wait as the medical team tried to figure out what was ailing their little son.  
  
From across the room, Veronica helplessly dropped her head into her hands. Cameron hadn't stopped crying since the nurse had pricked his heel in order to draw blood and all John could think was that he would welcome a thousand needle pricks, on every inch of his body, if it would only spare Cameron whatever sort of pain he was feeling.  
  
The nurse returned then and from under the sound of Cameron's frightened wails, he could hear her telling Veronica, "His fasting blood sugar came back at over two hundred milligrams per deciliter. I'm afraid that's a pretty good indication of diabetes mellitus..."  
  
"Diabetes mellitus?" Veronica whispered in shock, as the nurse approached John and Cameron.  
  
"I know, little man," she said soothingly, as she tucked a finger in the crook of Cameron's little arm. "I just need to take your vitals..."

John watched in alarm as slowly, the nurse's kind face melted into a mask of concern. 

"Excuse me, please," she whispered, before rushing out of the room.

Veronica and John exchanged a terrified look, before Veronica left the room in search of information.  
  
Cameron's cries stopped abruptly and John looked down hopefully, only to find that something much worse was happening.

"Cameron?" he whispered, as he held the baby up in the air, in order to get a better look at him. _  
  
_Cameron blinked at him and as he fought to take a deep breath, a low grunt emitted from deep in his throat.  
  
Icy cold dread seized John's heart. _"Cameron!?"_

Cameron continued to grunt with each, agonized breath.  
  
John sunk into a plastic, blue chair and balanced Cameron on his knees as he looked wildly around the room, praying that Veronica would come back within the next few seconds.   
  
Inhale, grunt. Inhale, grunt. The smallest of sobs and then...  
  
...inhale, grunt.  
  
"No," John said in a low, determined voice. "Cameron, _no_."  
  
Cameron stared back at his father and in his small eyes, John could have sworn he saw desperation. He opened his mouth and let out a tiny, thin wail.  
  
John gathered Cameron in his arms and held him tightly as he pressed his cheek against his little head. "Shush. Cameron, _shush._ It's all right, I'm here..."  
  
Looking up at the bright, artificial light affixed to the ceiling of the hospital room, John prayed, though he wasn't entirely sure if he was praying to his wife's God, or perhaps to Freddie...  
  
And as a sob slowly bubbled up in his own throat, he realized it was Sunday, and Freddie had a died on a Sunday, and he couldn't possibly let his son...  
  
The door burst open then but as a doctor in a stiff white coat approached with his arms held out, John jumped to his feet and backed away.  
  
"John?" Veronica whispered in surprise.  
  
"Mr. Deacon," the doctor said briskly. "Your son, please."  
  
"What are you going to do with him?" John asked in a low, distrusting voice.  
  
"He's dehydrated," the doctor replied, as he took a step towards John. "We're going to need to put an IV into his leg and hook him up to a breathing machine."  
  
John stepped back. "A...a what?"  
  
"A breathing machine, Mr. Deacon," the nurse piped up from behind the doctor. "We need to prevent him from going into shock."  
  
And with that explanation over with, the doctor came forward and placed his hands on Cameron.

"No!" John cried out, as he wrenched his son away from the doctor and cradled him in his arms. _"No!"  
  
_ "John!" Veronica exclaimed.  
  
The doctor blinked. "If you don't hand him over, you risk his death, sir."  
  
Veronica clamped a hand over her mouth as the nurse cleared her throat and said, "Dr. Bijou, I really don't think..."  
  
"I won't let you take him away!" John said, his voice hoarse with emotion as he backed into a corner.  
  
"Let us do our job, Mr. Deacon!" Dr. Bijou's voice boomed through the room.

John's lip curled in disgust as he glared at the doctor and held Cameron's little head against his shoulder.  
  
"Mrs. Deacon?" the nurse suggested.  
  
Veronica stepped in front of the doctor and held out her arms. "John, give him to me."  
  
"Ronnie," John pleaded. "Please..."  
  
Veronica came closer, and closer, until she was face to face with her husband. It was then that she saw his eyes were full of tears.  
  
"We need to trust them," Veronica said quietly, as she tucked her arms under Cameron's armpits.  
  
"I can't," John whispered as he clung to Cameron. "Ronnie, I can't lose him, too..."  
  
"We are _not_ going to lose him," Veronica said firmly. "He _will_ get better but in order for that to happen you need to _let him go_."  
  
John's lower lip trembled violently.  
  
Veronica widened her eyes meaningfully before John finally nodded and looked away.  
  
Veronica lifted Cameron out of John's arms, kissed her son's head, and handed him over to the doctor, who ran from the room with the nurse on his heels.  
  
John clutched his heart with both hands, turned away, and leaned his head against the wall.  
  
Veronica wrapped her arms around him and buried her face in his back.  
  
"They're going to help him, John," she said as her tears soaked his shirt. "You have to believe that."  
  
"Oh, like they helped Freddie?" John said in a voice that was hard as stone.  
  
Veronica raised her head, but kept her arms firmly around him. "That's different, John, and you _know_ it is."  
  
If John had learned anything in the past few years, it was that the thread of life was impossibly thin and _nothing_ was guaranteed.  
  
"Your grief is clouding your judgement, John," Veronica said, her voice fierce.  
  
"Freddie was healthy and robust and so..." John had to pause to swallow his emotion. "...full of life, and he was taken away anyway! Do you know what that means, Ronnie?"  
  
"No, John," Veronica shot back. "Tell me, what does it mean?"  
  
"That anybody can be taken from us, at any time!" John said angrily to the wall. "No one is safe!"  
  
Veronica released him, before spinning him around to face her and grabbing a fistful of his shirt.  
  
"Don't you _dare_ think like that, John Deacon," she said in a low, determined voice. "He's going to be _fine_. We're _all_ going to be fine and one day, this will be nothing but a memory..."  
  
She watched as John squeezed his eyes shut and bit down on his lip.  
  
"...just a really bad memory," Veronica said, softening her tone.  
  
A sob escaped John, twisting his face into misery. Veronica threw her arms around him and held him tightly. John thought to himself that if a doctor were to ever open him up and inspect his heart, he'd find it covered in band aids.  
  
"Oh John," Veronica whispered. "Shhh. It's all right."  
  
As the seconds ticked away and morphed into long, agonizing minutes, Veronica and John did the only thing they could do, which was curl up on the tiny hospital bed together, wait, and wonder. Eventually, John fell into a fitful slumber.  
  
Some time later, a weight on his chest woke him and opening his eyes, he was amazed to see Cameron.  
  
Ronnie was beaming, and John guessed that she had been the one to gently place Cameron into his arms, and now here was he was, safe and sound asleep, his head resting over John's heart as he snored softly.  
  
A tear of relief ran down John's face as he held Cameron close and whispered to him with a grin he could not control, "Shush, Cam. There, there."  
  
 ** _2019_**  
  
What followed in the long days after were afternoons filled with x-rays and breathing tests, intense education, and a final diagnosis of diabetes mellitus type one. And the years after that were packed with frequent insulin shots and dietary adjustments, serious monitoring and close calls, but John considered it all worth it because at least Cam was able to be here, today, telling him to shush.  
  
After the appointment, John returned to the kitchen to find Ronnie at the kitchen table with what was likely her fourth cup of tea of the day.  
  
She looked at him with that smile that always lightened his heart and said, "Well?"  
  
John sat beside her and shook his head in wonder. "He put his hand over mine and he said...'Dad, I only shushed you because I know how private you are and I knew people over the live stream could hear you and I wanted to shield you from that."  
  
Live streams. Bubbling brooks.  
  
"So in other words," Ronnie said, "his 'shush' meant something more."  
  
"I think it did," John agreed.  
  
"Sort of like when you shushed him in the hospital all those years ago?"  
  
John stared at her in surprise. He hadn't dreamed that she had been thinking about that day, too.  
  
And as he stole Ronnie's cup of tea, he thought to himself that shush could mean many things to many different people, but he knew exactly what it meant to him.  
  
It meant _I love you._

**Author's Note:**

> I was initially wary about posting this because it does involve present day John and Veronica while referencing Cameron and a recent stream. I do not want it to seem like I'm speculating or being disrespectful, which is why I purposefully did not write present day Cameron into the fic as an active character.
> 
> This was truly written with the utmost respect and admiration for the Deacon family. I was merely exercising my creative muscle. Nothing but love for them! :)


End file.
